More Fall Plantings

The rest of my fall planting order has arrived! Woo hoo! Here's what I've got:

Moon River Peony
California Hard Neck Garlic
Naturalizing Daffodils
Apricot Beauty Tulips

With that, and the fall season, comes some to-do's:

1. Find spots for and plant my new goodies!
2. Plant bulbs given to me by my voice teacher and his wife (I have a giant tray full of bulbs! Mostly daffodil...they think)
3. Plant more green onions, lettuce and mustard greens
4. Clean out pots. I have some iris and daylilies in containers from the apartment that I have been waiting to plant in the ground. Others are just past their prime and are looking scraggly or need to be brought inside before it gets too cold.
5. Stir compost and add leaves as they fall and are raked up

What does your fall clean-up/to-do list look like?

Blooms Day

Still on a role with cheesy blog post titles....I think the heat is starting to go to my head.

There are lots of blooms in my garden right now.

I've only gotten one bloom from the ranunculus tubers I started in my tiny greenhouse back in February. *sigh* It is lovely, though I was definitely hoping for more of a show!

The nasturtiums are really going to town. As many blooms as there are on this one, there are that many more buds ready to pop open!

The hydrangea is kind of a showoff. It blooms green and then turns pink, looking something like a disco ball in the process.

You can see there are many more blooms coming on this one!

Truthfully, I thought violas were not heat tolerant. It has been in the mid-high 80's though, and if anything, they are blooming even more vigorous than they did when it was still cool outside.

The ivy geranium has been giving wave after wave of these pretty clusters of white and pink blooms

The hosta hasn't bloomed yet, but I am hoping for more lovely purple flowers this year! Any suggestions yet on how to move this lovely?

The iris I dug up from my student's yard have finished their blooming, but this lily (also from my student's yard) is just getting started. There are several more buds on this one that have yet to open. Isn't the orange and yellow happy looking?

What kind of show are you getting in your garden? Any ideas on how to pack up and move my garden??

News, News, News

I hinted a few weeks ago here that I had some pending news to share. Well, it took a little longer than I expected, but here it is....

WE'RE BUYING A HOUSE!!!!!

Just in case you couldn't tell, I'm a little bit excited about it. The property is still in Inglewood, so we're not going far, but now I have to figure out how and what to move from the garden. I have purposely put off transplanting my started seeds into the ground, but what about stuff from the flower bed?

I am considering digging up the still tiny boxwoods and putting them into containers to put by the front door.

As for all the bulbs planted in this bed, should I dig them up? Just get new ones? The same neighbors that gave me these offered to let me dig up more from their overcrowded beds.

What about the daffodils that bloomed for the first time this spring? Should I dig those up and take them with me? Is it worth it?

I definitely want to take this hosta with me. I think it needs to be divided, but I'm not sure that would be a good idea while it's in the middle of it's growth cycle. Any thoughts on this?

Have you undertaken a garden move before? Did you take everything with you, or did you decide that some things would be too much trouble to move? HELP!!!

The Beauty of Pass-Along Plants

I spent about an hour today digging up some divisions of plants in the yard of one of my music students. Sadly, her husband passed away a few weeks ago and she is moving out of their house out in the country to a smaller home that will require less maintenance, but she offered me the chance to dig up some of her iris and day lilies before she left for good.

I love pass-along plants. They keep one person's garden from becoming over crowded while giving another person an economical way of filling bare spots in their garden. They also create great memories. It's great fun to walk through a garden that has many pass-alongs and recalling who and where each plant came from.

I know this is the worst time to be transplanting iris and day lilies (right as they are blooming or are about to bloom), but here is what I came home with...

 

 This day lily is about to burst into bloom with orange flowers!

I also brought home some lovely white iris, so tall I had to give them help to keep them standing.

Lastly, a few purple and yellow iris.

I didn't want to take too many, since I don't yet have a yard for them, but these plants will multiply and I'll be able to pass them along as well!

Do you make a habit of giving and/or receiving pass-along plants? I feel like bulb plants are the most obvious ones to pass along, but what other kinds of plants have you done this with?

Latest Update and Pictures from the Flower Garden

Ok, so I've been a little MIA lately....things have been a tiny bit crazy in my neck of the woods and I hope I'll have some good news to share SOON!

In the mean time, here's some pictures from around the flower garden to tide you over. I'll cover the rest in another post!

 

Ok, here's a full shot of the right flower garden. Look how giant the hosta is getting! I think it's bigger than the boxwoods.

 Also, here's a closer look at the Roman Chamomile (it doesn't make blooms for tea, but it smells nice when you walk on it!) that's going gangbusters around the ornamental grass that has yet to show anything but dead straw. I'm not worried yet....it did this last year too.

Even though I didn't dig up my dahlia bulbs last year, they're still growing back...who knew? Maybe it was just the crazy mild winter. Also, you can see that the busyness of late has kept me from keeping my flower bed completely weed-free.

Said dahlias are in this left flower bed. There are lots of irises in here, but they haven't bloomed yet. I'm thinking they aren't getting enough sun.

However, the hydrangea and geraniums seem to be lovin' their spot on the side of the house. It's an east-facing wall, so they get plenty of sunshine.

And if you look closely, you can see that I'm starting to get some buds on the hydrangea! Hooray!!

This handsome fella decided he needed to get in on the picture taking...and I couldn't resist showing him off!

What's going on in your garden these days? Any fun happenings?

Sprouting Daffodils and other Bulbs

My grandmother and I used to plant daffodil, tulip and iris bulbs together when I was a little girl. Not sure how much help I really was since as a very young child, I would often plant the bulbs upside down and my grandmother would have to dig them up and replant them right side up (oops), but we always had a good time gardening together. Some of those same bulbs were blooming last year at my wedding, held at my grandparent's house in South Carolina (my mother now tends the garden there, now that both of my grandparents have passed). To this day, bulb flowers are some of my absolute favorites, so seeing my own daffodil, tulip and iris bulbs begin to grow this spring is very exciting.

One of the flower beds in front of the house is currently filled with bulbs that are beginning to grow. No flowers yet (though I have seen many blooming daffodils in my neighborhood), but the foliage is definitely coming along nicely. Here's some of what I've got so far...

I've even got a daffodil sprouting on the side of the house...

Is there anything growing or blooming in your garden?